Amsterdam
The Rijksmuseum with Leyster, Ruysch and Merian, then the quiet Begijnhof.
Route by public transport ↗
They kept the country running.
Foreign travellers in the 17th century were struck by Dutch women: they traded, kept the books, signed contracts and argued with their husbands. While sailors were away for years, households, shops and workshops kept going thanks to them.
The Golden Age is often told as a story of merchants, admirals and painters. But behind every voyage to Asia stood women who ran the family and often the business at home, and widows who carried on companies. Some women became famous themselves: Judith Leyster became a master painter in Haarlem, Rachel Ruysch one of the best-paid painters of her time, Maria Sibylla Merian travelled to Suriname to study insects, and Anna Maria van Schurman became the first woman at a Dutch university. You can still see their work and their stories in museums across the country. Follow this guide from Haarlem to Amsterdam and The Hague.
From the Golden Age to today: artists, scholars, campaigners, resistance heroines and champions. Pick a colour.
The Haarlem widow and businesswoman becomes a legend during the Spanish siege of the city.
See it at: HaarlemA master in the Haarlem painters' guild, with her own workshop and pupils.
See it at: Rijksmuseum →, AmsterdamThe first woman at a Dutch university, behind a screen in Utrecht.
See it at: Museum Martena, FranekerArtist and naturalist, she travels to Suriname to study insects and plants.
See it at: Rijksmuseum →, AmsterdamBecomes court painter in Düsseldorf; her flower pieces are among the most expensive paintings of her time.
See it at: Mauritshuis →, The HagueBorn at Zuylen Castle. She writes novels and thousands of letters, thinking aloud about freedom and marriage.
See it at: Slot Zuylen, UtrechtThe first woman to study officially at a Dutch university, in 1879 the first woman doctor, and a champion of women's suffrage.
Wilhelmina is inaugurated at eighteen. In the Second World War she addresses the nation on Radio Oranje from London.
See it at: Paleis Het Loo →, ApeldoornWomen win the right to vote. A year earlier Suze Groeneweg became the first woman in the Dutch parliament.
She helps thousands of mostly Jewish children reach safety in England with the Kindertransport.
See it at: Dutch Resistance Museum →, AmsterdamGoes into hiding in the Secret Annex and writes the diary that is read around the world.
See it at: Anne Frank House →, AmsterdamHer family hides Jewish people in their home above the watch shop. In 1944 they are betrayed.
See it at: Corrie ten Boom House, HaarlemThe girl with the red hair, a resistance fighter from Haarlem, is executed three weeks before liberation.
See it at: HaarlemWins four gold medals at the London Olympics: "the flying housewife".
Juliana succeeds her mother and becomes queen.
Publishes Oeroeg, about friendship in the colonial Dutch East Indies, and becomes one of the country's greatest writers.
The first Jip and Janneke stories appear. She becomes the queen of Dutch children's literature.
The first woman minister in the Netherlands.
Beatrix becomes queen: a Leiden law graduate, a sculptor and a patron of the arts.
One day, four moments. How to get the most out of your visit.
Six places to complete your museum day.
Home to Frans Hals' famous group portrait of the regentesses of the Old Men's Almshouse, painted in 1664: women who ran a large institution. The museum is in that very building.
Look for Judith Leyster's Merry Drinker, Rachel Ruysch's flower pieces and the work of Maria Sibylla Merian, and notice how often women do the work in the paintings.
Rachel Ruysch's flower still life shows why princes queued for her work. Look at the women in Vermeer and Jan Steen too.
For centuries a courtyard where unmarried women lived together, independently. A quiet square in the middle of the city, free to visit; please keep quiet, people still live here.
This museum in Franeker has a room on Anna Maria van Schurman: scholar, artist, writer in many languages and champion of education for women.
Kenau Simonsdochter Hasselaer was a Haarlem widow who ran a shipyard and timber business. During the siege of 1572 she became a legend. Walk from the Grote Markt to the Kenaupark.
Three day trips to the women of the Golden Age.
The Rijksmuseum with Leyster, Ruysch and Merian, then the quiet Begijnhof.
Route by public transport ↗The city of Anna Maria van Schurman, with the Dom and the old university.
Route by public transport ↗Rachel Ruysch and Vermeer at the Mauritshuis.
Route by public transport ↗Travel times are indicative. Live times on 9292.nl ↗.
Haarlem is small, beautiful and calm, with the Frans Hals Museum in the centre. Amsterdam is fifteen minutes away by train, The Hague and Utrecht under an hour.